It was an old hunter in camp and the hunter shared tobacco with him and told him of the buffalo and the stands he'd made against them, laid up in a sag on some rise with the dead animals scattered over the grounds and the herd beginning to mill and the riflebarrel so hot the wiping patches sizzled in the bore and the animals by the thousands and tens of thousands and the hides pegged out over actual square miles of ground and the teams of skinners spelling one another around the clock and the shooting and shooting weeks and months till the bore shot slick and the stock shot loose at the tang and their shoulders were yellow and blue to the elbow and the tandem wagons groaned away over the prairie twenty and twenty-two ox teams and the flint hides by the ton and hundred ton and the meat rotting on the ground and the air whining with flies and the buzzards and ravens and the night a horror of snarling and feeding with the wolves half crazed and wallowing in the carrion.
I seen Studebaker wagons with six and eight ox teams headed out for the grounds not haulin a thing but lead. Just pure galena. Tons of it. On this ground alone between the Arkansas River and the Concho there was eight million carcasses for that's how many hides reached the railhead. Two year ago we pulled out from Griffin for a last hunt. We ransacked the country. Six weeks. Finally found a herd of eight animals and we killed them and come in. They're gone. Ever one of them that God ever made is gone as if they'd never been at all.
The ragged sparks blew down the wind. The prairie about them lay silent. Beyond the fire it was cold and the night was clear and the stars were falling. The old hunter pulled his blanket about him. I wonder if there's other worlds like this, he said. Or if this is the only one.
Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
I'm planning on running a game of
Call of Cthulhu via IRC. We'll meet probably once or twice a week depending on availability. The game will probably run two to four sessions depending on how fast we move through it. You don't need to know the rules but it would help a lot. A basic rundown of the rules is
here.If you're not aware, Call of Cthulhu is a tabletop horror RPG. Players control a group of ordinary people investigating sinister events. Beginning the game ignorant, by degrees they become aware of the horrors of the Great Old Ones, the insignificance of mankind, etc. It's a fun, different kind of RPG. Combat is very lethal for investigators and many of the more alien creatures are resistant or impervious to mundane attacks. Magic is rare and powerful but immensely costly. It's a game about horror, sacrifice, and perseverance against the inevitable. It's fun!
This game will be a little different from most CoC games. No 1920s gumshoe stuff. Read the quote above for an idea of the setting and theme. Your characters are traveling across the Great Plains of the newly formed Kansas territory, somewhere in the eastern part of what is now Colorado. The Civil War is ramping up and tension pervades the air as abolitionists and slavers grapple for control of the new territory. The great extermination of the American bison is nearly complete here and the prairie is littered with bones for miles in all directions. The town of Lordsburg, where you'll be making your next stop, has posted a bounty on Indian scalps as violence between settlers and the local natives builds to a fever pitch. Savage mercenaries and irregular cavalry units stalk in from the West to take advantage. In the months to come this place will be soaked with blood. There's enough human horror here for anyone; what nightmares lurk outside the bounds of Man's imagination?
Interested? I'd like to brainstorm characters and the like early because I want to tailor the adventure to your motivations. Character creation can be done on the first session if it needs to be. Four players is probably best, and if there's more I'll choose the most appropriate. Characters can really be anyone who might be making their way through the great plains in 1854. Western stereotypes and mutations thereof can be interesting; not everything will be completely politically correct. Noble Indians, gruff sheriff types, bounty hunters, bonepickers, not so noble Indians, settlers, as long as it's tasteful and doesn't turn into jokes or a minstrel show, Western archetypes are generally cool. Keep in mind that slavery is still going on and Kansas's stance hasn't been determined. Violence over slavery is going to erupt in the next few months. A free black character could be interesting but it might be hard to do.
We can also talk about playing times. If you can't set aside three to five hours at least once a week it'll be hard to include you. I don't like playing sessions where people regularly go missing. It kills immersion and confuses the story. I'm GMT-5 and pretty open as far as time goes. If everyone else can make a time, I can probably make it as well.
The setting and premise may be familiar to you. If you know or suspect you know where I got my inspiration, please keep it to yourself. Thpoilerth!
Author
Topic: Old West Call of Cthulhu via IRC - First Session Tomorrow (Read 5891 times)